News:Museum of Sex exhibits modified plush toys

from WikiFur News

February 18, 2007

Meeko, a popular plush toy, now on display

New York City, USA – The Museum of Sex, which first opened in October 2002, has covered many controversial topics - from Chinese erotica and male objectification to pin-up photography and sex workers. Now they are extending their coverage to the erotic side of the furry fandom with a new exhibition: Kink: Geography of the Erotic Imagination.

Opening February 7, the show was patterned after the 2000 book Deviant Desires, and features costumes, props, photographs, videos, recreated environments and original artwork from the leather, bondage and shoe fetish communities, as well as "more exotic destinations" such as ponyplay, adult babies, macrophilia, sploshing, medical play, mudlarking, body expansion - and lastly, furries.

The exhibit's curator (and book author) Katharine Gates gained notoriety within the fandom for her book, as well as an interview in the Vanity Fair article Pleasures of the Fur. This, along with coverage like Sex2K's Plushies and Furries, led to a tightening of media policies that remains to this day, particularly at Midwest FurFest.

According to founder and executive director Daniel Gluck, the museum

...will allow visitors to try on fetish costumes, climb into bondage furniture, and play with kinky props.

WikiFur News has found that these props include two plush toys modified for sexual purposes - a commission from German plushophile Mryia Jackalope made last November. The commission consists of one Meeko raccoon - a brand so popular among plushies that it spawned a unit of measurement - and one rabbit. When asked, Mattel's explanation for Meeko's popularity was "Well, he is a cute little guy."

Kink will remain on display through October 2007. The Museum is located at 233 Fifth Ave. (27 St.), New York, tel: 866-MOSEX-NYC.